Todays mini series of things you can do right now focuses on enhancing the accessibility (a11y) of focusable indicators in your application. Let's get into it:
Why it Matters:
- Accessibility Impact: Clear focus indicators are crucial for users with disabilities to navigate effectively, ensuring they can identify interactive elements.
- User Experience: Proper focus indicators prevent confusion and empower users to interact with your application confidently.
Quick Check:
- Manual Scan: Quickly review your application for interactive elements that may lack visible focus indicators using tab navigation. You may use Enter or Spacebar to activate buttons or links.
- Automated Tools: Use accessibility testing tools such as Axe or WAVE to identify elements with missing or inadequate focus indicators.
- Screen Reader: Sometimes a screen reader might use different keys to activate focusable elements so ensure you check using both with and without a screen reader.
Quick Fixes:
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Enhance Focus Styles: Ensure interactive elements have clear and distinct focus styles, making them visible and easy to identify. Typically this involves adding a solid color outline or changing the background color of the element.
- Avoid disabling the default focus ring provided by browsers unless you replace it with an equally visible alternative. This is particularly important for keyboard users.
- Ensure that all focusable elements have consistent focus styles across the application to maintain a uniform user experience
- For low vision or color-blind users ensure a highly visible focus indicator, such as a thick outline or contrasting color is used so there is no confusion.
Focus Management: Implement proper focus management to ensure that focus moves logically through focusable elements, enhancing keyboard navigation. An example would be when a user clicks a button that opens a modal ensuring that the focus moves into the modal dialog and on close of the modal moves back to the button.
const openModalButton = document.getElementById('openModalButton'); const closeModalButton = document.getElementById('closeModalButton'); const modal = document.getElementById('modal'); openModalButton.addEventListener('click', () => { modal.style.display = 'block'; modal.setAttribute('tabindex', '-1'); modal.focus(); }); closeModalButton.addEventListener('click', () => { modal.style.display = 'none'; openModalButton.focus(); }); Testing
- Thoroughly test your application post-fix, using both keyboard navigation and assistive technologies like screen readers, to ensure focus indicators are visible and functional.
- Consider writing automated tests with Axe to automatically check for focus indicators as a custom rule.
const customRule = ` axe.configure({ checks: [ { id: 'focus-visible', evaluate: function(node) { const style = window.getComputedStyle(node); return style.outlineStyle !== 'none' || style.boxShadow !== 'none'; }, metadata: { impact: 'critical', messages: { fail: 'Focusable elements should have visible focus styles.' } } } ], rules: [ { id: 'focus-indicator', selector: ':focus', enabled: true, any: ['focus-visible'], tags: ['focus'] } ] }); `; By following these quick steps, you can quickly enhance the accessibility of focusable indicators in your application, contributing to a more inclusive online environment for all users. Accessibility is an ongoing journey, so start making a positive impact today!🌟
Helpful links
Free A11y tools:
- NVDA Screen Reader
- Axe DevTools Chrome Extension
- WAVE Browser Chrome Extension
- Web Developer Chrome Extension
- ANDI Accessibility Testing Tool
A11y Info:
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